So a few weeks ago my cousin mentioned having read my last post, Nonprofit Girl Gets a Sandwich, in which I chronicled two encounters between myself, the heroic Nonprofit Girl, and two villians, Clipboard Dude and Creepy Stranger Dude. My cousin asked me if I really find myself getting "accosted" much on the streets of Publicville.
What I wanted to say was, "Accosted? Me? No, of COURSE not!! Everything is fine. Everything is awesome, and the world is awesome, and I'm awesome, and the dudes on the street are awesome, and THERE IS NO BAD LEFT IN THE WORLD and my parents should not worry about me, and I should not worry about me, because bad things do not happen anymore, and I just cannot wait to jump out and show my face to the world every morning!!!!!!!!!"
 |
| THERE IS NO BAD LEFT IN THE WORLD!!! |
Secret's out, I guess. I like to (read: have a neurotic compulsion to) present the most cheerful disposition I can muster when I'm in situations where I have to speak words. Damn, I'm not a very genuine person, am I?
But also, on the subject of being accosted on the streets of Publicville, (I know, back to the point, already!) I don't want to make a big deal about my experiences because they are really not that bad.
Right? They are not that bad. Looking at a list of types of street harrassment, I've never gotten "sexually explicit comments," "vulgar gestures," "groping," or been the "target of public masturbation" (Oh man. Let's pretend we didn't read that last one.). I haven't been "followed" or had my "path blocked" since high school, and I'm pretty sure I'm not going back there.
So, no. I don't get accosted much on the streets of Publicville. The occasional "leering," "whistling," and "sexist comments" doesn't really justify complaining, in the scheme of things.
It makes me feel like I am staring straight into a black hole, and it gives me that sick feeling in the pit of my stomach, like the mask of civility is as thin as tissue paper and in fact underneath it the world is not awesome but thoroughly awful. But that's just my sensitive mind. In reality, it's not that bad.
That's what I told myself. But on the same day I was telling myself it's not that bad, Soraya Chemaly was posting an article to HuffPost Women to validate my feelings, the feelings I was trying to invalidate.
So, my last post was humorous, but if you'll allow, I'd like to take this opportunity to put forth a very sincere "no but seriously, y'all." Soraya is right:
Street harassment is a serious issue because it's the most visible symptom of a society that uses fear to control more than half of the population ... Anywhere between 80 percent and 98 percent of women surveyed report persistent, aggressive street harassment ... 69 percent of women surveyed chose not to make eye contact for fear of harassment. When 69 percent of women regularly are thinking about avoiding eye contact, it's a serious problem.
Eye contact is an important component of freedom, civility and equality. Even my 14-year-old instinctively knows that. Her rule to assess risk is whether or not she can "look him in the eye, freely, and say thank you the way I would to a woman." ... Street harassment is the tip of a very big iceberg. As Emily May, a founder of the end harassment movement Hollaback, describes it, public harassment is a gateway behavior to domestic violence and rape. If a man feels entitled in public, what does he do in private?
...
Street harassment is NOT about sex. It's about power. It's subtle and pervasive social control. It says to girls and women, "you can never be sure you are safe out here and I can control where you go, when you walk, whether or not you smile, what you wear and how you feel." It's not flattering. It's not fun. We aren't "asking for it." The normative public intimidation of women is a debilitating blight on equality.
(Emphasis mine)
Damn straight the normative public intimidation of women is a debilitating blight on equality. Shame on anyone who says it isn't - I will never downplay it again. I don't want to hear that I'm "purdy" any more than I want to hear that I'm ugly, because saying it insists your opinion should have some value to me. It declares that you are the Judger and I am the Judged. It says, "You didn't think you were put on this earth just to go about your own business, did you?"
My life is not a pageant, it is my life. When a stranger "compliments" me, what he is really saying is, at worst, "I'd fuck you," or at best, "You are here for my entertainment." That is objectifying (read: soul-stripping), intimidating and thoroughly malicious. Yeah, sure, a lot of the people who engage in these activities don't realize the sick ideologies they are acting out of, or the harmful consequences of their behavior. Tough shit. That doesn't change anything.
 |
| See, the thing about objects is, they are not alive. And that's kind of a big deal. |
Well, now that I've embraced my anger and shared it with all you lovely people, the time has come at the end of the blog post where I am supposed to posit some "actions" you can take to combat the massive, worldwide, institutionalized ideology of women's oppression. Okay, let me see what I can come up with.
Ladies. You have probably been told you were overreacting every time you ever got angry. You were taught to be grateful for every attention that was paid to you, much of which, from the time you were an infant, was based on "how pretty you look!" and "how cute that dress is!" But now we have to recognize how those messages have taught us to distrust ourselves and become blind to our own realities.
Let's listen to ourselves, and listen to each other. Honor your anger. And pass it on. And you know what's more? Let's talk to our husbands and boyfriends about our anger. They should be our allies.
 |
| Don't set guys' beds on fire. Do make art about setting guys' beds on fire. |
Guys. I'm going to assume, for argument's sake, that you are not seething with rage toward me right now, though what I've seen from commenters on other feminists' articles would suggest otherwise. I hope you will be aware of what goes on around you, even though you don't have to be, and don't assume certain things are not happening because you never noticed. I assume none of my readers are street harassers, so I will just say, even with your female friends, colleagues or relatives you really shouldn't compliment their appearance at all (your wife or girlfriend excluded). Because your opinion is irrelevent, right? Right. But mainly, please, just don't forget.
And of course, the kids. Kids today need to learn about the big bad F-word: feminism. They'll probably learn something about it in college, but widespread harassment of girls starts in middle school or earlier and becomes rampant in high school. We cannot wait until college to teach kids about feminism - 56 percent of girls and 40 percent of boys will have already been harassed and intimidated at school, and many of them will have already harassed and intimidated their peers.
I am following Stop Street Harassment and Hollaback on Facebook, to help me remember, and to help spread awareness and to keep an eye on their movements in case any opportunities come up that I might want to get involved in. That's the least I can do for myself and for my hurting society.
I believe I should be free to smile on the street without suffering unwanted advances. I believe I should be free not to smile when I'm displeased, and so should you. Shouldn't it go without saying?
No comments:
Post a Comment